With an interview with ABC News, President Barack Obama says he now supports same-sex marriage, ending months of equivocation on a subject with powerful election-year consequences.

With an interview with ABC News, President Barack Obama says he now supports same-sex marriage, ending months of equivocation on a subject with powerful election-year consequences.

Photo: ABC News

Image 3 of 3

President Obama's support for same-sex marriage

1 / 3

Back to Gallery

Many Americans no doubt recognized their evolution on the issue as they heard President Obama describe his transition from apprehension to acceptance to unequivocal support of the right of same-sex couples to marry.

His bottom line was common among a growing number of Americans who have examined the reasons behind their reluctance: There is no valid reason, as a matter of civil rights and humanity, for denying the full rights and responsibilities of marriage to gays and lesbians.

"I have hesitated on gay marriage in part because I thought that civil unions would be sufficient," Obama said in an interview with ABC News on Wednesday. He added: "I was sensitive to the fact that for a lot of people, the word 'marriage' was something that invokes very powerful traditions, religious beliefs and so forth."

The fact that the word "marriage" does have meaning - in law and in the way a relationship is viewed in this society - is exactly why it is important to end this entrenched discrimination against couples who are trying to care for each other and their children without government-created impediments.

President Trump addresses nation after mass shooting at Florida SchoolWhite House

Obama's declaration of support for same-sex marriage does contain an element of risk. Though roughly half of Americans support marriage equality, the numbers are decidedly lower in some of the socially conservative swing states. But the completion of Obama's evolution will allow him to argue his position more forcefully and logically. No longer will he be caught between criticizing efforts to block gay marriage - in state constitutions and the federal Defense of Marriage Act - while stopping short of endorsing full equality.

Mitt Romney, the presumptive Republican nominee, is clinging to a position that is fraught with contradictions. In an interview in Denver, Romney said he not only opposed same-sex marriage, but also "civil unions if they are identical to marriage other than by name."

Romney pointed to domestic partnerships and hospital visitation as rights that "are appropriate" for government to extend to same-sex couples. But, he added, "The others are not."

There is a word for the notion that a government can deny rights to a targeted class of people based on the perceived superiority of an innately human characteristic: bigotry.

President Obama has aligned himself firmly on the right side of history. He, as so many of us, drew upon his personal observations of friends and colleagues in concluding that there was no way to rectify this injustice short of saying those simple, welcome and overdue words: "Same-sex couples should be able to get married."